Help vulnerable children in eSwatini

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The winter in eSwatini can be cold and windy. In July, the temperature can be less than +10 degrees at night. Most houses do not have electricity or any other form of heating. My good collagues in BDO have now started an initiative to collect clothes for the children in eSwatini. The intention is to ship the clothes end of April, when the winter is approaching. We are therefore interested in children’s clothes in size 3-6 years. Please contact me (atle.sundoy@gmail.com) if you have clothes or shoes you will donate.

This week, All out Africa held their Christmas party for the children and staff. This year, the children visited a farm and were shown a lot of animals before they had a nice Christmas party with plenty of food and lots of fun

Below, the message we received from our friends in eSwatini.

“Dear team members, sponsors and supporters. On behalf of all the All Out Africa we will thank you for not leaving out the NCP children and teachers.
Your contribution will enable us to have a Christmas party which we would
not have possibly had, It will also help us provide quality early childhood
education to the less privileged children in eSwatini.

We are very grateful to you as this support really is invaluable and we
appreciate it very much. The children had lots of fun viewing the farm and
interacting with the animals. After their 20 minutes touring the farm they
then got to enjoy their xmas picnic. This would not have been possible
without you. One again thank you so much we really appreciate your
generosity.

On Friday we are having our graduation at Nkhanini NCP with only one
graduate :). We are hoping to have more children graduating in the future.
The graduation will be co joined with the children’s Christmas party and I
will send you pictures after the ceremony.

May God bless you abundantly and wishing you a merry Christmas and
prosperous new year!”

Last year, we sponsored a Christmas party for the children and the teachers at the NCPs. The children were treated with extra food and played at a playground on a local hotel. The party was a huge success and the children and the staff really had a good time, as you can see on the pictures below.

We intend to sponsor the Christmas party also this year.

If you wish to contribute to the Christmas party, you can send your contribution on VIPPS to All out Africa Stiftelse #102351

Below, please find an update from Swaziland (or eSwatini which is the new name) written by Eunice, one of the staff at All out Africa. Even if I will not be able to visit the project this year, we will continue to support the project with the good help from our friends and donors.

Atle

Nkhanini NCP

Nkhanini NCP, who currently have 15 children between the ages of 3-6 years. These children are still under the care of one Teacher (Teacher Mbali), and the children adore her because of the love she has for them. This is evidenced by the way they interact with each other in my presence during my site visits. Through your support and other various sponsors, you have been able to build an eating area for the children to use for days when the weather does not suit the children to be outside, i.e. during rainy or extremely hot days. In additional the completion of a kitchen and storeroom was a success. Beyond this, we have also re-painted the swings and sew-saw so that it looks even more attractive to the young ones and cut grass around the NCP and toward the toilets. This has made the environment child friendly and safer.

Mlindazwe NCP

Mlindazwe NCP has been working on completing their kitchen and storeroom, at the moment Michael and his team of volunteers have completed painting inside and are currently working outside. We had an American volunteer named Louise, who actually was a returning Volunteer, assisted us with painting a beautiful elephant on the classroom outside wall.

Mvutjini NCP

As you well know this NCP joined our community partnership outreach in 2017. We have had amazing volunteers who donated and worked on painting the inside classroom walls for the children with Alphabets, Letters, Colors and Numbers for easy learning. We also have a nutritional intern from the US who is conducting a second annual e-pap survey. This is a highly nutritious fortified food. This intern shall comply a report and present to us before she leave in about 10 days on her findings.

Tooth-brushing Campaign

Hygiene is a common issue throughout the NCPs and we have distributed toothbrushes to all NCP children to instill hygiene. This is in line with our curriculum. We have tried to run a winter campaign where we were requesting for companies or individuals to donate winter clothes to share with our children so they can be warm in winter. Unfortunately this initiative was not successful due to very little positive response received.

NCP School Trips

Currently, we are conducting educational trips to Mlilwane Game Reserve with all NCP, which included 3 NCP, namely Nkhanini, Mlindazwe and Bethany. We are planning to complete these trip for the rest of our NCP’s in June.

Homework Club

We still continue doing homework three times a week with our primary school students, in order to help improve on their English, Math skills and also instill the love of books to these vulnerable children.

Primary school uniforms

We support primary school going children with school uniforms. This is made possible by sponsor who have committed themselves yearly to this initiative. The school uniform has been delivered to our offices and awaits distribution to the rightful beneficiaries. This will bring the desired changed i.e. children will not absent themselves from schools due to harsh weather or feel different from other children, which should boost their self-esteem and probably improve on their school work.

The Christmas gifts we sent from Norway in December was delayed due to a strike at the customs office in Swaziland but has now been distributed to all the kids at the NCPs.

Tjengisa, the man on the pictures, sent this message today:

We are very pleased to send you photos of the recent disbursement of the Christmas gifts. The children were so excited and happy to have received the cards, and well written in Siswati. That’s amazing and thank you. Also we have received the money for one NCP operational cost for half the year. In addition a big thank you for the Christmas party donation of R10,000.00 and this money has been duly received with gratitude. Thank You, Thank You, Siyabonga Kakhulu!!!

Please also thank our “All Out Africa” Family in Norway with our warmest regards

First with the good news, I managed to deal with Customs yesterday and we finally received the gifts!!! They are in the office now and already Eunice and I are trying to organise logistics for the beginning of the year. Photos to follow in 2018.

Your generous spirit has brought so much comfort and joy to so many people in Swaziland, there are no words to describe the gratitude they feel. The best we can say is thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

Unfortunately, there is a strike at the Customs in Swaziland. The gifts we sent are therefore stranded in Mbabane at the moment. This is the mail I received today:

Hi Atle,

Hope you are enjoying the festivities leading up to Christmas.

I just wanted to give you an update on the gifts.

Unfortunately, the Customs Strike is going on so we still have not received the gifts. I went up to the head office on Monday to find a way forward but I got no help. I am going to see them again today and hopefully I can get some help.